Presentation
by Thrice Seven Once Eleven
Summary: Megamind's thoughts as the brainbots zip him into his new suit.  He is less than happy.  One-shot, filler.


It seems the only things I can write for any new fandom are sort of sad. The first fanfic I ever wrote, _Requiem_, for Good Omens, contains major character death. This is somewhat lighter than that, luckily, but it's not exactly a _happy_ fic (the next one will be happier, I promise). I apologize if it is terrible or over-the-top, it's un-beta-ed but I had to get it out. Review, and let me know how it might be improved? What did you like, what didn't you like?

My first Megamind fanfic. Oneshot. Megamind's thoughts as the brainbots zip him into his new suit. Megamind doesn't belong to me, and I make no money from writing this.

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The only things that had bothered him about the disguise were his hands.

He was okay as long as he didn't look at his hands. Luckily, the weather was still cool and Bernard had been wearing a sports jacket when Megamind had scanned him, so he didn't have to deal with two garishly pink arms staring him in the face every time he made a gesture. Not that he had a problem with pink skin. It was fine on other people, just not on him. And the hands—Bernard's hands, squarish and blunt-fingered and obstinately pink—had bothered him.

But it hadn't mattered, had it, because it has never been about Megamind's perception of himself. No. It has always, always been about _other people's_ perceptions of him, and Roxanne is no exception.

It is all about presentation.

What's the use of being good if they only see him as being bad? What's the use of pulling a mouse from a trap if the stupid thing is only going to find its way into Teacher's desk later? It's only going to land him in the corner, never mind that the little creature would have died otherwise.

Megamind had realized early on that people only see what they want to see; after all, the reminders had been all but constant. He had tried to be good, but what was the _point?_ Everyone else had _wanted_ him to be bad, had _told_ him time and again that he was bad, bad, bad until finally he had shrugged and just gone along with it. Sure, why not. He would be bad.

Besides, Metro Man had needed a worthy opponent. He had always broken humans so _easily_. Megamind's options had been to either stand up to Metro Man, or to remain in mediocrity and watch pathetic, human wannabe villains shatter themselves against Metro Man's invulnerable chest. Megamind had suffered the same problem—no human could stand against what he threw at them. It had always been safer for everyone involved if he and Metro Man just vented their respective frustrations on each other and left the humans out of it.

For the most part. Roxanne Ritchie had always been an exception to that rule, but there had been an unspoken agreement between Megamind and Metro Man that she not be injured by their games. Initially, Megamind simply hadn't seen any point in actually hurting her (why bother wasting valuable energy, really?), but after a while he came to understand that if he ever actually _did_ hurt her, Metro Man would skin him alive. And if Metro Man had ever _allowed_ harm to come to Roxanne, Megamind would have led him a merry chase to the ends of the earth and back, spreading unnecessary collateral damage and pain and death in his wake, starting with Metro Man's mother.

Because _of course_ they had known each other's limits and capabilities. _Of course_ they knew how best to hurt one another, had they ever truly wanted to, and _of course_ they had made sure to keep their more serious, painful encounters out of the public eye.

But none of that had been necessary, and Megamind hadn't really wanted Metro Man _dead_. It was all just—presentation. That is all it has ever been.

Honestly, Megamind had been more surprised that his plan had worked than anybody. And after it was over, he had grieved more deeply than anyone but Minion would ever know. Metro Man had been his foil, the one person he could never fully outsmart, and Megamind's over-the-top rejoicing over Metro Man's death had been more because he knew he _should_ be happy than that he actually _was_. As far as anyone is concerned, Megamind has always been bent on Metro Man's destruction, so it would have been a bit odd, wouldn't it, if he'd turned up at the memorial service in somber black as a mourner? As it was, he didn't go at all, which was only slightly less odd than if he had gone and crashed the party, but either way, the people see him as a monster, and _he plays the part_.

(The relief he feels when he finds Metro Man still alive makes him go weak at the knees, though he does not dare let that show. Weakness interferes with his image, his presentation.)

And that is why he _almost_ enjoys wearing Bernard. He can stop worrying about his image when he is wearing Bernard, because Roxanne's perception of him as Bernard doesn't affect her perception of him as Megamind at all.

He can _almost_ pretend that when she smiles at him, she is truly smiling at _him_, and not at a lie. He can't see his own face, after all. He's just a pair of eyes in a fleshy prison, and who _cares_ what it looks like as long as it suits his needs? For a while, it works beautifully.

But time passes, and all he can see is Roxanne's smile, and _he_ is comfortable and safe and _she_ is smiling and laughing, and then he looks down at his hands and he wants to die. He wants very badly to run and hide and die very quietly by himself in a corner, because this isn't him—rather, it _is_ him (he is more himself as Bernard than he has been in years), but he cannot be himself and _himself_ at the same time without his new-found beautiful world crumbling around him, and that is why looking at Bernard's hands hurts so very badly, because they are a reminder that the only thing holding that world together is a _lie_, a rotten _lie_, and being bad has never felt so _wrong_ before.

He wants to be sick. When he twists the watch and sees his face change in the broken mirror, he wants to be sick, but he smiles instead because it is all about presentation.

Minion is right. He _knows_ Minion is right, but Megamind has been so desperate for some small semblance of _normal_ for so long that he is absolutely willing to wear a lie for the rest of his days if it means he can continue to have someone special smile at him like that. Minion smiles at him, too, of course, but it isn't the same. Megamind loves Minion like a brother, but he loves _Roxanne_ like—

No.

It is enough to acknowledge that he loves her. That, in itself, is quite enough.

He loves her, and he will be what she wants him to be. For the rest of his life, if he has to. He doesn't mind (he minds). It has never been about what _he_ wants (just once, just _once_, can it _please_ be what _he_ wants?), and he is used to that. He doesn't mind. She is worth it.

And that is why, _that_ is why, when she tears his heart out and waves it in his face before tearing it in half, he turns and leaves instead of fighting. She is worth it, and he has hurt and scared her, and only people who really are evil do things like this, and he wants to throw up. And he does. Later.

What he wants, what he really wants, is—never mind. It doesn't matter. It has never mattered. It will never matter.

He stands before his mirror, as he always has, alone.


End file.
